


Look at me

by Wow_girl1244



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Idiots in Love, Love, Love Confessions, Pre-Relationship, Unrequited Love, pre-reveal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-30
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:21:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24992995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wow_girl1244/pseuds/Wow_girl1244
Summary: In which Adrien doesn't know how to talk to Marinette.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 8
Kudos: 150





	Look at me

**Author's Note:**

> hello, yes, it is me, a fanfic writer who disappeared for months before finally coming back.  
> any who.   
> thank you so much for reading, and i hope you enjoy this!  
> please leave comments or feedback, i appreciate it endlessly when you do.   
> happy reading!

The party is in full swing when Adrien arrives. It was a relief-a big one-to realize he’s wearing the proper attire. Jeans and a white shirt. He’d almost gone for the suit. He smiles at his classmates, huggs Chloe, and pauses to talk to people he’s met before and people he’s never seen before.

All the while, his mind is on one thing. Finally he sees her, across the room, head tilted back in laughter. Such a cliche moment, he thinks, and yet it feels like he was sucker punched all the same. His breath stolen, lights dimming, all his focus on her. He knows her laugh so well he can hear it from here, a tinkling bell. He imagines it’s how a rose would sound if one could laugh, but flowers have always paled in comparison when it comes to her.

He manages to tear his gaze away from her and instead looks at Nino and Alya. The former has his arm swung around her shoulders as she animatedly tells a story. He makes his way towards them, and they stop talking when he comes near. Marinette’s face freezes, a smile but not her true one. She’s never given him her true one. It’s all he dreams of.

She’s kind. There’s no doubt about that. She’s invited him here after all, to a party at her apartment, but she’s never quite taken a liking to him, and, well, he can’t blame her. It seems that no matter how hard he tries, no matter how much he thinks through his words, when she’s in front of him his mind doesn’t function. _Look at me,_ he wants to say. _LOOK AT ME_ , his mind seems to scream, but her gaze strays from his, there and gone too quickly for him.

“You made it,” she says, a forced cheerfulness in her voice. Her hand hovers near him before awkwardly patting him. Nino winces and Alya shakes her head slightly. The two seem all too aware of the situation between their friends despite Adrien never voicing his romantic notions.

“Well,” Adrien replies, swallowing. He wants to hug her so badly. He wants to tuck that stray strand of hair behind her ear. He wants every cliche in the world with her. He smirks. “I wanted to see my friends, all of whom were always invited. Why wouldn’t I come?”

She stares at his chin. He knows there’s nothing there, she just always refuses to meet his gaze. “Right. Your friends. Them.” It was clear she was saying that she wasn’t his friend, which he supposed she wasn’t. It dug a hole in his chest, empty, waiting for her. She shrugs. “Well, there’s drinks over there.” A dismissal, as clear as one can be.

He nods, hugs Alya and Nino and heads to the refreshment table. Things could have gone worse, he consoles himself. Yet, they never seem to go better. He takes one more look at her. Alya has gone back to telling her story, but Marinette’s gaze is glazed over, that same smile over her face. He thinks he’s ruined her happiness. He hates himself all the more for it.

He turns back to the table. Nothing better than getting drunk, he supposes, to solve all his problems. And thats exactly what he does.

A few hours later and Marinette’s apartment is stuffed. Adrien is used to this. He regularly attends events for his father, crowded with people all trying to talk to him. Here it’s more natural. Here it’s better. Still, he finds it hard to breathe, hard to keep a smile on his face, hard to keep his eyes focused when there’s only one person he wants to stare at. Deciding he needs a break, he heads for the roof. The door to the apartment is propped open, and, unsurprisingly, so is the one to the staircase. He passes a couple making out and makes his way out. He wonders if it’s incredibly good luck or horribly bad luck when he sees Marinette there, leaning against the railing.

He hesitates for a second before deciding that a moment alone with her, no matter how badly the interaction goes, is better than none at all. Besides, knowing she’s here alone makes it impossible to leave. Perhaps it’s also the alcohol and the fact that it somehow just centered his thoughts around her. He walks over to her. If she’s surprised when he leans on the railing next to her, she doesn’t show it. He stares at her, unabashed. Her pert nose forward, long eyelashes creating shadows on her face, pink lips pursed slightly in thought. She is so beautiful. _Look at me, please look at me_ , he thinks. Like always, she doesn’t.

“You know…your side profile…it’s unique,”he says. For a second her spine straightens and he thinks she’s going to turn and meet his gaze but instead her eyes drop and she shrugs.

“Guess I’m no model, huh?” Adrien can’t tell if she meant it as a blow to him, but, and this might be the fact that he is drunk, he thinks she sounds hurt. He shakes his head, opens his mouth to correct her, but she’s already shaking her head and staring back at the city skyline.

Marinette doesn’t look at the stars like he expects, rather she stares out in front of her, like perhaps all the beauty in the sky is no match for the beauty created and sculpted by human beings.

It’s no small surprise to him when she speaks up. “Do you ever wonder what it would be like to run across the rooftops?”

He doesn’t have to wonder. He knows. Chat Noir frequents those rooftops. “Like Chat Noir and Ladybug?” He startles when her shocked gaze flashes to him for a second. Blue meets green and he falls into the ocean. He could drown in them, and maybe he will, because when she looks at him he forgets to breathe. She fills him up, ever breathe he takes is her, her, her. Then she looks away and he breathes again. He thinks he hates air.

“No,” she says quietly. “Like in a place between time. In which I’m no one and nothing. I’m the wind, blowing across the city. I am the city. I’m everything and everywhere.”

“You already are everything and everywhere,” he says, his voice just as soft. When she looks at him, his whole face flushes, and he realizes he drunk more than he thought. But she doesn’t look away from him this time and so maybe it was worth it.

Marinette’s blushing as well, her eyes wide, lips slightly parted. Angelic is the word he would use, but he thinks that truly nothing could compare to her beauty. The music is a distant thump from downstairs and he imagines it’s shaking the floor, that it’s the reason he steps closer to her and brushes her hair away from her face like he’s always wanted to. Her hair is just as soft as he always imagined, but her skin is like silk and he finds it is incredibly difficult to tear his hand from her. She’s magnetic, pulling him in. It’s always pained him to have to draw back, when she beckons him simply by being.

“ _You_ ,” he says with so much emotion he knows his heart must have cracked open. “You could never be no one or nothing. Maybe a million years from now, when the universe is nothing but stardust, everyones name will be forgotten. But not yours. You are the beauty the flowers aspire to have. Your soul outshines any star. And your name? Your name is all that runs through my mind, it’s all my heart knows, and so it will never be forgotten, because how could I ever forget you?”

He thinks that maybe he’s passed out on a couch somewhere having the best dream of his life because the next think he knows she’s grabbing his shirt and yanking down to him and her lips are on his. He sucks in a startled breath and it’s all he needs to know he’s obsessed with her. She smells like sugar and vanilla, she tastes like love, and she feels-she pulls away too quickly, before he can even kiss her back. Her hand over her mouth as she steps back.

“I-I’m _so_ sorry, Adrien, I don’t know why I did that. Well, I mean, I do know, it’s because I’ve only been in love with you since lycée, and I’m drunk enough for it to embolden me, and I’ve wanted to do that more than I’ve ever wanted anything, and you were saying just the most perfect things. But thats no excuse! And now I’ve just gone and confessed my feelings for you, and I know you hate me, but I-”

He cuts off Marinette with a kiss. For a second she just stands there and he wonders if he made a mistake then her arms are around his neck, fingers threaded through her hair, and she’s kissing him back. One of his hands wraps around her waist, pulling her flush against him, and the other cups her face, tilting her head, as he licks her lips, wanting to remember how she tastes forever. As if he could forget. She makes a little noise, one which will definitely be making its way into his dreams for many nights to come, and then he’s twisting them, pressing her against the railing. One of her hands tracing his cheekbone, his jaw, his ear, and the other pulls him closer by his shirt, the fabric yanked between her fingers.

In his distant mind he thinks his father would be so mad that this shirt was getting stretched, but thats so distant and he doesn’t care at all. Marinette opens her mouth to him and he sweeps in. Nothing, _nothing_ could ever compare to this. To holding her in his arms. To knowing her so intimately now. To knowing she loves him.

He knows, somehow, he just knows that they are both burning, a shooting star falling at last, knocked out of orbit by some uncontrollable force, yet there’s nowhere to land and so they continue hurtling on.

Then the door to the roof is being opened, and another drunk couple is coming out. Marinette pulls away and slides out from between him and the railing. The couple, neither of which Adrien recognizes, apologize and go back to where they came from.

He stares at Marinette but she’s looking at the door now, like she’s ready to bolt. She regrets it, he thinks. It hurts more than he thought possible, but at least he knows now. No, no, it’s worse now. He _knows_. Knowing is so much worse than anything else. It’s worse than the rejection he knows he’s about to face. He opens his mouth to apologize, but then she’s talking.

“I thought you hated me,” she whispers.

A sharp laughter sounds out from him. “ _What?_ Marinette, I’ve been in love with you for as long as I could remember. I thought…well, I know I’m not that good at talking, so maybe it wasn’t…I didn’t know how to talk to you. I thought you hated me.”

Her gaze meets his again and its like he’s being struck by lighting. She looks angry and it exhilarates him. She’s never looked at him with anything other than that plastic smile. She shakes her head rapidly. “How could I?”

He smiles. “How could I?”

For a second she just stands there, then she giggles. Better than a tinkling bell, than flowers rustling against one another in the wind, than anything else in the world. “Well, we’re certainly not the smartest pair.”

He laughs as well, and when he notices her staring at him, with wonder in her eyes, and a big smile on her face, it’s all he can do not to take her in his arms and kiss her again. He wonders that she feels the same way about him that he does her. He feels whole, at last. He can’t help himself from touching her so he takes her hand in his. She smiles shyly at him. He plans on learning how to paint so he can capture this exact moment. He knows nothing and no one could do it justice, but still. Brushing his thumb across her knuckles he turns her hand over and kisses her palm. When she blushes he thinks he’s finally figured it out. Plagg will be so proud when he tells him.

Marinette steps closer to him and they are both in each others arms. “Marinette,” Adrien asks softly. “Would you want to go on a date with me tomorrow.

She smiles as she looks at him. “I would love to.”

And all he can think is, _finally_.


End file.
